Written by Caryl Churchill
Directed by James McDonald
Synopsis:
Guy would do anything for Sam. Sam would do anything. Drunk Enough To Say I Love You? is a modern day love story with consequences far greater than any foreign affair.
NYTHEATREREVIEWS.COM:
"Ever wanted to vote Republican just to spite someone? Well that's how this lifetime leftie felt after sitting through the torturous 45 minutes that make up Caryl Churchill's new 'Drunk Enough to Say I Love You." A right-wing polemic from anti-gay, anti-everything Rush Limbaugh would be more balanced and nuanced than this "play" about big bully America and poor, sissy England. If you are planning to vote for Nader, you might find this tirade against US policy for the last 60 years just the soul-gratifying ticket of the year. Anyone else will be hard pressed not to groan at the obviousness of the whole excercise. People were apologizing left and right to their dates after the lights went up. I know I did. Some decent staging and okay acting make for minimal pleasures. I would only recommend this to someone who is writing a thesis on the playwright. "
NEW YORK TIMES:
"But with Ms. Churchill, one of the most inventive and incisive dramatists of her generation, even rabid venting takes the form of a brave, canny exploration of theatrical language that comes to startling life on the stage. Her natural talent can’t help asserting itself, so that even when she’s uncontrollably angry, she’s beautiful. "
Read the whole review HERE.
NEW YORK POST:
"CARYL Churchill's "Drunk Enough To Say I Love You?" lasts for all of 45 minutes, but you're not likely to go away eager to see more. This highly elliptical work is a provocative yet ultimately frustrating example of the sort of experimental theater that's a lot more interesting to think about than actually sit through. "
Read the whole review HERE.
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS:
"Whether you buy the author's philosophy, the production is slickly staged by James Macdonald. Scott Cohen gives Sam a pushiness and irresistible charm. Samuel West, as Guy, has the right trace of submission. As they talk, the sofa rises ever higher — a throne built for two headed to heaven. Or maybe it's destined to be burned by the sun. "
Read the whole review HERE.
THEATERMANIA:
"A question the production doesn't want to raise -- but inevitably does -- is whether Drunk Enough to Say I Love You? is already dated. When Churchill was writing the piece, Tony Blair was still in office and his prime-ministerial view of the American-English alliance prevailed. Under the more skeptical Gordon Brown, that outlook has altered. These days, Guy may not at all be drunk enough to say, "I love you."
Read the whole review HERE.
VARIETY:
"The idea is ingenious in its simplicity -- distilling a half-century of British-American relations into a darkly sexualized love affair between two men, one conflicted yet fawning and compliant, the other an unscrupulous manipulator. And what playwright could be more adept at translating that allegory of insidious interdependency into austere, elliptical language than Caryl Churchill? But despite the arresting stagecraft of James Macdonald's production, suggesting a rigorous symbiosis between director and writer, "Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?" is a short, sharp provocation that feels just a tad too easy. "
Read the whole review HERE.
NEW YORK SUN:
" Ms. Churchill is now in her late 60s, and perhaps there is some connection between that fact and the fact that the politics of "Drunk Enough" feel dated. Her themes — America's done terrible things, and England's a dupe — register as pat oversimplifications. In any case, watching two flat characters go through the paces of a joyless, utterly predictable exercise makes for meager theater."
Read the whole review HERE.
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